Lindy Ruff's line changes not enough to halt Stars' losing streak

1/65

Brad Penner/Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports

Jan 10, 2014; New York, NY, USA; Dallas Stars left wing Antoine Roussel (21) and center Cody Eakin (20) and left wing Ryan Garbutt (16) celebrate Garbutt's goal in front of New York Rangers right wing Ryan Callahan (24) during the second period of a game at Madison Square Garden. Mandatory Credit: Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports

NEW
YORK — The Stars couldn’t lose a couple of weeks ago, and now they can’t
win.

They gave up a goal to Rick Nash with 1:58 remaining Friday and lost, 3-2, to
the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden. That stretched their season-worst
losing streak to five games and pretty much washed away the 5-0-2 run that put
the Stars within shooting distance of a playoff spot.

Maybe most disappointing is that the Stars built their wins on some of the
West’s best teams and have lost all five games to Eastern Conference teams who
have been struggling. The Rangers pushed to 23-20-3 (49 points) with the
victory, while Dallas fell to 20-17-7 (47 points).

“We played well enough to win,” said center Cody Eakin, who had a goal and
assist and helped lead the Stars’ best line of the night. “We had some good
chances, but we didn’t get the results we wanted.”

The Stars tweaked their lineup again, and the Eakin-Ryan Garbutt-Antoine
Roussell line was fantastic. Roussel was coming back from his first healthy
scratch of the season, and the trio was reunited for this game. They scored both
goals and created most of the team’s scoring chances. And they showed what the
team does best — play a speed game.

“That’s when we’re successful, when we’re moving our feet,” Eakin said.
“We’re not the biggest team, but we can make it hard on other teams because our
transition game is good. We got back to a lot of areas that are good, but we
still have areas we have to straighten out.”

Like getting that kind of play throughout the lineup. Rookie Valeri
Nichushkin had a rough night and was benched for long stretches. And the Rangers
finished the night with a 34-26 edge in shots on goal, a 37-21 advantage in hits
and a 45-28 advantage in the faceoff circle.

Those were all numbers the Stars were dominating during the winning streak.
The entire trip through the New York area was an analytical nightmare. The Stars
lost the battle of metrics in every game, but coach Lindy Ruff said he saw
improvement.

“We were a lot better tonight,” Ruff said when asked about turnover problems.
“We were really bad on the Island, we were better in Jersey and we were better
tonight. There were guys on the bench putting pressure on each other to take
care of the puck, and as soon as you get peer pressure, we’ll start to win
again.”

Dallas had a 1-0 lead on an Eakin goal and a 2-1 lead on a Garbutt goal, but
both times the Rangers came back. Derick Brassard scored on a power-play goal to
tie the score in the second period — the eighth power-play goal against in the
last seven games for Dallas — and then Nash won it on a nifty play in the final
two minutes. Nash was falling and lifted a rebound shot over Kari Lehtonen for
the game-winner.

“In a tight game like that, it’s being able to defend , it’s being able to
take advantage of some offensive opportunities,” Ruff said. “We had some looks,
we could have got the deciding goal early in the period, but we didn’t. They
didn’t have a lot of real good looks, but the last one they had went in.”

And that seems to be the way things are going right now. When they score
goals, they give up too many. When they get great goaltending, they don’t score
enough.

To post a comment, log into your chosen social network and then add your comment below. Your comments are subject to our Terms of Service and the privacy policy and terms of service of your social network. If you do not want to comment with a social network, please consider writing a letter to the editor.